IELTS Live - Task 2 Writing - Band 9 Essay Skills

hi students and welcome to today's live ielts class my name is adrian and i'm streaming to you from beautiful victoria on the west coast of canada i hope everybody is having a great week so far staying healthy staying strong and being productive hi kyber welcome sammy good to see many of our members in the class and welcome uh pam charmin nice to see many of our students as well as in this class we are looking at writing section specifically task two uh we're going to be talking about those band 9 essay skills and i've got a brand new question for you today to go over and begin this lesson is presented to you by ae help.com for academic ielts success uh visit us there for the general islets check us out at g ielts help dot com that's generally help dot com on both of our websites we have writing help for you we have lots of materials for you to improve your communication and your english welcome carolina our moderator to the chat as well this is our academic ielts website here with the blue background you can click this big red button when you're on the website to get our premium package with hd videos practice exams apps for your phones it is a one-time payment for lifetime access so definitely well worth it we are an official ielts registration center and uh certified agents as well so you're in good hands and our general ielts website looks like this with the green background you can click this big red button to join our premium package there of course you will find that the reading and writing section on this website are specifically designed for the general ielts you can check us out on instagram as well ielts underscore a help gl's help you can download our apps academic ielts help and general ielts help and with all of our online software you get the most advanced online ielts course if you have questions just write to me adrian aehelp.com just a reminder everyone especially members in this case channel members we will have a q a session tomorrow so uh join us for that and now let's get into our task two questions so uh task two writing it's uh 40 minutes arguably the single most challenging part of the ielts exam in my opinion because it's the most subjective we can say that so it really depends on the examiner that's marking you what kind of mark you're going to get they do have a marking scheme but again writing's quite subjective it's even more subjective than speaking so you have to do a really really good job all right charmin good luck on your exam on the 21st okay everyone so step number one read the question uh read the question slowly and carefully do not rush okay here we go task to writing you should spend about 40 minutes on this task let's read many advancements in technology are making people's lives easier users need to think and do less to achieve tasks discuss the positives and negatives of this development and give your own opinion you should write at least 250 words band 9 essays are in most cases closer to 300 350 words of well-developed ideas so 250 is the absolute minimum you do not lose scores for going over you do lose scores for going under okay um tom yeah it is absolutely possible for non-native speakers of english to get a band 9 in the writing section and it's of course also possible for native english speakers to not get a band 9 in the uh speaking sections so definitely yeah absolutely okay i'm gonna darken the screen a tiny touch so you get a bit more contrast there okay all right so for this question your first step to make sure that you clearly understand what's going on to conceptualize the information is to paraphrase the question now paraphrasing the question is not necessarily your introduction okay band nine introductions are not just a paraphrase of the question that is misinformation that a lot of students are seeing online and in other ielts courses so if you simply just paraphrase the question and say this essay will discuss the positives and negatives or the merits demerits you will not get a band 9 for that style of writing okay iii productions the examiner in the computer-based exam does not need to count the words um because there's a word count uh articles like the or ah or on they do count as words and in the paper-based exam they count four or five lines take an average multiply by the number of lines and then they have a fairly accurate word count okay um while i'm responding to these questions uh go ahead and paraphrase this question as much as you can okay all right kyber says a lot of developments in computers and machines are making individuals lives simpler as users do not need to think a lot to obtain their goals um write about the advantages and disadvantages of this notion and include your own perspective very good kyber okay rahul says numerous improvements in technology technological boom oh okay i see what you're saying rahul let me start that one more time so numerous uh improvements in technology have become a boon for humans discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the same okay yep that works yeah you're using boon as like um an aide yeah good man is asking when will the exam be conducted sir uh manpreet you have to reach out to your ielts exam registration center where you registered for your exam they're the only ones that can tell you when the exam will be conducted at their center okay oluwassola says in recent times there has been a widespread consensus about the uh technological age where people's way of living has been simplified what are the advantages and disadvantages of this kyber um paraphrasing itself is not really a deserving of a band level but it was fairly good kyber couple of slight mistakes uh i would say like a seven five off the top of my head okay rashika says lots of technological developments are making individuals lives convenient they don't need to research to obtain goals discuss the advantages and disadvantages of these developments and give your own perspective okay very good yeah so um the progression and technology has enabled humans to simplify many tasks in daily life in order to obtain goals um such that less effort is needed express the advantages and disadvantages of this change and provide your own perspectives or perspective okay so here's my paraphrase and in this way now i am certain that i have a clear understanding of this question so the progression in technology has enabled humans to simplify many tasks in daily life in order to obtain goals such that less effort is needed express the advantages and disadvantages of this change and provide your own perspective okay so now i'm sure that i understand what this question specifically is asking me i'm starting to collect some useful vocabulary and now i can really plan my essay so when you're doing this at home you have to practice uh step by step uh the proper approach to high band task to writing in the exam when you're sitting there and you're actually getting into this 40 minutes of task 2 you need to understand the question and plan your essay in about four or five minutes so no more than four or five minutes okay all right so what's my next step so after i paraphrase the question what do i do next okay so i paraphrase the question i have clear understanding i can probably use my paraphrasing at some point in my introductory paragraph um what do i do next okay uh sami says you you have to apply uh some critical thinking and sami you're right and in combination with gineal so janil says that you have to identify the topics and the controlling ideas that's really important because you have to know what you're talking about why you're talking about it so in this case um what's the topic what are we actually talking about and when you're thinking about the topic don't look at your paraphrase but look at the original question so many advancements in technology are making people's lives easier so look at that original question to come up with the topic kyber says advancements in technology is what we're talking about i don't actually think that's what we're really talking about kyber um [Music] amit says technological advancements yeah okay nissan much better so nashan says new technologies reduce human effort yeah that's what we're talking about okay so i agree that's really what we're talking about so new tech reduces the need for human effort this is what we're actually talking about is the decrease in the need for human effort thanks to technology okay yeah rajveer very good so rajvir says advancements in tech make life easier that's what we're talking about yeah yeah call deep be a little bit more specific but you're on the right track so uh reducing um the effort for humans from technology yeah okay all right good now you've now you've got it now you're okay so we're talking about the decrease in human effort as a result of technology um and what's the controlling idea here oh yes kyber absolutely the topic could be a sentence yeah definitely there's no rule um students that the topic of an idea or question has to be one or two words it could easily be a phrase okay so for dav says it's the pluses and minuses of this trend okay so the pros and cons of this trend absolutely yeah so the pros and cons of this trend and my personal opinion okay the question asks for that it says what do you think right so what's your opinion all right um so let's start that critical thinking that jay neil was talking about so what does it mean that technology decreases uh human effort for goals so what does that actually mean okay so when we say that technology lowers the demand for human effort what do we actually mean by that okay so this is where you want quick good critical thinking so that you have some really good content uh for your essay so that's what we're working on here is that really good content okay so bernard says sophisticated technology makes human work easier uh makes certain tasks automated it saves time as well as uh effort um for dog says the technology thinks and does for the humans okay for dobbs i think you're thinking about the how a little bit uh technology palma says frees up people's time okay kyber says i mean that computers think and save a lot of time good so many people are now realizing that yeah time is often the great variable that feeds into most concepts rajvir says tech helps to reduce the requirement of physical and mental effort to achieve goals yeah so a reduction in the amount of physical and mental energy and the amount of time needed to accomplish tasks through automation or we could say technological automation okay so what does it mean technology decreases human effort to achieve goals i would say it's reduction in the amount of physical and mental energy and the amount of time needed to accomplish tasks through technological automation okay all right um yeah so you know i for dobbs i agree with you basically another way to say this is we need to think less right okay all right good um so what's the next question what's the next question again i keep telling students this and i know that students who are really paying attention to these lessons and send me emails this is what many of the emails will ask me is how do i know what question to ask how do i know what's the right question so sami says why and sammy you're you're right but can you write the full sentence question so what's the full question not just why because here we could say like why what there's a couple of different why's okay so ravi mystery the how is the third question so how does technology help uh to do all of this that's going to be the third question okay and this is where ravi a lot of students make a mistake as they jump from the what question to the how question but they forget about the why question um so more importantly we want to ask the why question okay amit says the question should be why technology decreases the effort for humans according to rahul the question should be why people are using technology sami says why tech helps humans okay victoria says in what way is this possible victoria that's just a fancy way of asking how does it work okay so that's the how question all right um ferdov says why is this trend popular okay uh nico says how does technology decrease so nico you're also jumping the y question so notice students that there's um clearly some of you who are saying why but sorry some of you are saying how but many of you are saying why so you have to be clear here that the order of operations for critical thinking and logical thinking in most cases is what why how okay so keep your thinking in this order when you're writing your paragraphs as well all right so david says why is it important to determine technology's impact on society yeah there's a good question david absolutely okay so because we are dealing with the topic right so uh the topic is new tech reduces the need for human effort right so i think a very good question that david is asking it related to this question right is uh why is it important to determine technology's impact so why is it important to determine technologies impact um on uh humans sure i think that's a good why question okay and another why question and i think it's kind of related that comes to my mind is um why do humans pursue easier living through technology okay so these two are kind of related let's answer them one at a time um so let's start with the one that david suggested i think it's a really good approach so why is it important to determine technology's impact on humans so why are we talking about this and of course many of you that have taken lots of classes with me know that this is feeding directly into the background of the introduction so why discuss this okay so why why do we want to know that why do we want to know uh technologies um importance in this sense okay so amit says because millions of people use technology every day uh that's a very good argument okay so one answer here would be because most people rely on technology on a daily basis yep absolutely okay for dave says because people want to live as kings and queens not prince and princesses the correct expression for doves is because people always want to live as kings and queens okay um rajvir says because it has a direct relation to human product productivity yeah all right yeah lots of good answers okay so i would say because most people rely on technology on a daily basis um because it is important to know the long term outcomes of the dependence on technology okay so we want to kind of predict the future that's what humans do right we think about the future we think about hey if we keep going down this road will my children live a happy healthy life if suddenly we all discovered that this is a terrible direction that we are all going to become overweight uh satire blobs of um fat uh that really don't do much just uh have technology kind of flying around us and taking care of us uh at some point we might say whoa whoa guys let's try to slow down with technology and go a different direction because i don't want my grandchildren or my great-grandchildren to be just giant blobs of people sitting in a floating chair uh being catered to by technology right so so we want to know what the long-term effects uh will be of technology's uh dependence or humans dependence on technology okay all right um and um let's answer this question too so why do humans pursue easier living through technology so why do we have this great desire for technology to minimize our efforts yeah david's like okay i got you it's like the wally reference right yeah there's a reason why they came up with that idea david you bet they were probably sitting in a room um and brainstorming about ideas just like us okay all right so um why do humans pursue easier living through technology why make life easier with technology sami so what's the reason for that okay so kyber says the reason why humans pursue simpler living through technology is that they want to spend their energy on other tasks as well as to save time yeah i agree kyber so uh people want to use their time on activities they choose and enjoy rather than what they must do such as daily work okay so that's kind of the difference between work and hobbies right so people want to spend their time with their hobbies and not with their work so not tasks that they need to do in order to make a living or to do their necessary tasks such as brushing their teeth cooking a meal washing the dishes right we have dishwashers now we have very advanced cooking machines as well so people want to spend it with activities that they choose like playing video games okay um so more effort invested into activities they want to do and they want to spend less energy yeah a lot of you are writing that people are tend to be lazy and want to use less energy so um it's a fair argument okay uh people want uh to avoid um energy demanding uh labor okay so yeah it's kind of interesting how this has really happened in modern society but people do not like to break a sweat so there's a nice expression for you break a sweat um people these days they don't like to sweat so if it means running to the bus stop and breaking a sweat or walking to the bus stop and being late for work and not sweating many people will actually just walk to the bus stop and be late for work right okay so uh the question is how so how does uh tech this is the next question how does tech uh make people's lives easier and ha here you want to think of some examples so think of examples so what are some of the most recognizable what are some of the most recognizable examples of how technology is making people's lives easier there's a couple really funny ones that kind of pop into mind for me let's see if you come up with them and again sometimes thinking of examples will give you a lot of clarity for what you will write in the essay okay so keep that in mind thinking of great examples uh will enable or i should say empower you to write amazing essays okay so this is that down up type of thinking where you actually think of the example and then uh think of your points so um okay so monder says working remotely okay via the internet um ferdav says how about washing machine yeah okay uh washing machine okay there's one that really comes to mind from my generation uh definitely where i'm like uh i'm not sure i completely agree with that uh i know some of you will uh probably realize this as well kashusha says tesla knurling prathamesh says elevators yeah i think elevators is a really good example that's not what i was thinking of but that's definitely a really good example of technology i live in an uh 14-story building and i'm always so amazed when one of my neighbors who is young and able will stop the elevator on the second or third floor to go down with the elevator so i'm on the 11th floor i'm going down with the elevator and i expect that i'm on the ground floor but no the elevator stops on the second floor and there's a young 20 year old guy or girl that's like oh okay i'm getting on the elevator to go one floor or two floors and they don't have shopping bags in their hands or anything i'm just like uh really so um lepay says elevator as well okay all right okay saw a correction of then then there but i didn't see where i wrote that so um okay um yeah so elevators one that comes to mind for me are electric uh scooters okay uh yeah i'm really amazed at the popularity of those little electric scooters and i think they are great for certain uses but it does worry me when i see young healthy teenagers and young adults using that kind of machine to go a couple of kilometers from their home to their school or from their home to their work rather than walk or use a mechanical scooter that you just kind of pedal on okay that's kind of yeah so all right um so there's definitely a lot of examples that can make you think about the utility of machines for humans okay so what are the positives and what are the negatives the positives we already talked about so people can spend more time on their hobbies and socializing that's clearly the positives of technology making our lives easier so people can spend more time and energy on their hobbies and socializing okay uh so then what are the negatives okay um uguman nabiev or sorry ugulhan nabieva says uh the negative side is less physical activity yeah okay so okay here's some vocabulary for you so um low amounts of physical activity leading to muscular atrophy muscular atrophy means basically the muscles becoming weak so the muscles of your body your circulatory system like your heart okay so rashika says just generally speaking uh health problems uh palma says people becoming lazy and under motivated yeah so low physical activity leading to muscular atrophy and a little effort leading to decreased motivation and achievement yeah it's a it's a give and take right it's that age-old story that uh there can be no light without darkness there can be no good without bad and that also feeds directly into our sense of accomplishment or achievement when we work hard to achieve a goal then achieving the goal is that much sweeter it's that much greater when it doesn't take us much effort then we don't really have that feeling of reward or that sense of achievement okay so at this point i mean we can keep going down this uh path deeper and deeper it is the ielts we have 300 350 words to express our ideas we're not writing a 2 3 000 word um essay for university so we don't need to overthink it uh as long as you've gotten this far you're doing a great job one last step is your opinion is it good or bad and with a question like this it's really easy to sit on the fence so it's really easy to say well it's both good and bad i think it's both good and bad um but at the end of the day you do want to give your opinion okay so you do want to express your own position and it always makes for a more interesting read when the author or the messenger has an opinion okay so fardog says i have a balanced opinion even if your opinion is a little bit balanced here just go to one side or the other okay so all right don't don't do a 50 50. it's easy to do a 50 50 here but for the ielts to make your essay stand out to make it a more interesting read i would still recommend doing one side over the other okay so palma says i think it's good all right um yeah the thesis will be coming up after this so sure we can say that it's good yeah so here you can really go both directions on it it's just important to go one direction it will make for a more interesting read right okay now we can come up with a thesis okay the thesis is the last sentence of your introduction it contains the key points of the essay and it should be direct okay direct thesis clearly states the points of the essay it doesn't just simply say this essay will discuss the negatives and positives so uh go ahead everyone and write your thesis statement so based on what we have just discussed about the topic the controlling ideas um the positives the negatives and your own opinion let's all stick with the same opinion for this one um don't go to the negative just so that we can work through the same essay okay all right so let's see some thesis statements all right um i don't really see any thesis statements there yet okay i see some opinions uh faisal in the thesis you should really only have two points and your opinion so point on positive point on negative and then your own point okay so uh tom henderson says considering the enormous benefits brought on by the development and technology um the this is mostly you have to rethink that tom it's a little bit redundant it's awkward so rephrase how that reads okay all right um sammy says although technological advancements have certain negative impacts on society i personally believe it makes energy okay good i like it sammy so you're being very clear and direct here uh rajvir says although there are some clear negatives of relia of over-reliance on technological advancements i believe these evolutions are a blessing for humans as it saves time and energy okay good all right uh kyber writes although some individuals believe that this notion could lead to some health problems such as muscular atrophy i believe that it could save a lot of time and energy as this could be invested in other activities such as spending time with family okay good kyber uh it's a good thesis just don't go into too much detail so spending time with family and muscular atrophy i would save those for the body paragraphs okay so i think that's too much detail for ielts okay little mermaid says in my opinion the overall influence that technological breakthroughs have on people's lives is positive as they save both human energy and time while enabling them to be better at communication all right little mermaid you're just answering half of the question students remember and this is why it's good to reread the original question so the original question is uh discuss the positives and negatives of this development so you have to do both and you have to give your own opinion okay all right so my thesis would be something similar to what many of you are writing so um the demand okay let me be a little bit more specific here because we still have the rest of the introduction the deficits of over reliance on technology are physical and mental deterioration for humans however i believe that the positives can be more significant such as saving time and energy for a healthy and social activities so uh here is my thesis statement uh by this my body paragraphs are crystal clear so the deficit over reliance on technology are physical and mental deterioration for humans however i believe that the positives can be more significant such as saving time and energy for enjoyable healthy and social activities okay all right so by this now my reader has a crystal clear idea of the direction that my essay is going to go so let's start this essay now uh with the introduction i should start with the book okay the hook is a very very short simple sentence that introduces the topic of the question the essay to your reader and catches their attention and yes the hook is important in the ielts for those higher band scores okay when you're thinking about the hook you should be thinking about 10 to 12 words maximum right rahul says technology has become a part and has become part and parcel of daily lives yeah okay i i like that okay uh kyber says people want advancements in technologies they want to live simpler and not break a sweat okay good for you kyber to use that expression that i mentioned i think it's too much like it's a little bit too long a little bit too complicated simplify okay le pay i see your thesis it's okay sammy says technology plays a major role in individuals lives how about something even simpler so um humans have become extremely dependent on technology these days right uh i think if you look around and you see people hugging their mobile phones we realize how true this is or when you see people uh that misplace their mobile phones and they panic where's my phone where's my phone where's my phone um can you imagine 50 years ago where's the phone where's the phone people be like what's wrong with that person um anyway it is what it is right that's the world we live in so um introduction uh humans have become extremely dependent on technology these days right okay that will catch your reader's attention right okay um so now the background the background is definition and importance of this question so uh what do we mean by um dependence on uh technology what do we mean by uh making people's lives easier through technology okay and why is it important okay so on a daily basis people simplify their lives by using technological aids to communicate work and travel the long-term effects of this interdependence or this relationship with technology uh warrants further uh investigation okay that's exactly what we discussed right and then uh comes the thesis okay so uh i know that most of you who are in the class from the beginning will be able to do this because all we're doing here is we're really using what we already came up with in the planning stage of this essay so uh now i just put in the thesis and here we go so here's my introductory paragraph from start to finish so humans have become extremely dependent on technology these days on a daily basis people simplify let's make some corrections here so this is what i mean by reviewing each paragraph when you're finished so humans have become extremely dependent on technology these days on a daily basis comma okay and i don't want to use the word days and daily close together like that okay um in modern times so it'll read better uh not simply their lies but simplify their lives okay all right let's do this again so humans have become extremely dependent on technology in modern times on a daily basis people simplify their lives by using technological aids to communicate work and travel the long-term effect of this relationship with technology warrants further investigation the deficits of over reliance on technology are physical and mental deterioration for humans however i believe that the positives can be more significant such as saving time and energy for enjoyable healthy and social activities okay that reads well so i'm confident that i'm on the right track i've got some good writing and you can always further further improve your writing like for humans here is not necessary it's understood okay you want to be as concise as possible all right so um review review review okay so we don't need humans there okay um humans in the beginning uh who's suggesting that i think it should be humans with an s humans yeah have become extremely dependent sure you always want to avoid mistakes in your hook as well so go back and review your introduction make sure your introduction is clean crisp and strong okay all right okay students so that's the introduction and i'm going to stop there for now uh if my voice is cracking no worries because we're just coming to the end of today's lesson and i'll definitely fix it for the start of the next one i'm not going to tinker with it now all right if you have more questions about writing just send me an email my email is adrian aehelp.com if you have an essay we can give you a free score estimate on what you would likely get okay uh and uh i highly highly recommend visiting and joining our premium packages at aehelp.com for academic outs and gltshelp.com for general outs oh by the way we will finish this essay tomorrow at the same time so we will write the body paragraphs and the conclusion um in the meantime gileshelp.com green background big red button get the premium package it doesn't cost a lot you get a lot of materials a lot of great strategies and practice you get apps etc uh click that big red button we are an official ielts registration center and certified agent so you are in good hands um that's it for me for today and i hope to see all of you tomorrow if it's the start of your day then i hope that you have a great productive rest of the day if it's the end of your day then sweet dreams to you and i am adrian signing out from victoria in canada bye everyone much love to all of you you

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Id: D4SSzhSQIPQ

Length: 53min 20sec (3200 seconds)

Published: Thu May 13 2021